A Basic Historico-Chronological Model of the Western
Hermetic Tradition
Introduction
PART I
The topic which I have been assigned
resolves into a question: ‘What part, if any, does speculative
Freemasonry have within the western Hermetic tradition?’ There are
two contrasting ways of trying to answer that question:
- that which uses a historico-chronological
model which represents the present prevailing orthodoxy in
Masonic historiography and
- that which uses a symbolic or thematic
model.
Viewed in a chronological sequence,
according to Antoine Faivre, the main currents or components in
the western ‘Mystery’ tradition are
- neo-Alexandrian Hermeticism;
- Christian Kabbalah;
- Paracelsianism (or the observation of
Nature as a Divinely authored ‘text’ permeated by decipherable
‘signatures’);
- Philosophia occulta (the magical vision of the cosmos which unifies
Nature and religion theurgically);
- Alchemy;
- Rosicrucianism;
- Bohemian theosophy;
- Martinism and
- The Hermetic Order of the Golden
Dawn
Since speculative Freemasonry, in the form
which would be recognised most widely these days, first became
manifest in London in 1717, I suppose that the Masonic phenomenon
could be added into that chronological listing perhaps somewhere
between, say, 7 and 8. However, I want to reject that approach
in the present context not because of anything faulty in
its basic rationale but because it leads to the
restrictions of a largely unspoken assumption: that there must
have been a definite, identifiable time (and perhaps even a
precise location) prior to which Freemasonry did not exist and
after which it did. That underlying assumption has led Masonic
writers to conjure up some remarkable and diverse theories as to
Freemasonry's origins. Amongst the more questionable of these (in
alphabetical order only) have been:
- the Culdees or Colidei or
Keledei (the remote religious communities which existed
in 7th – 12th centuries in Ireland and
Scotland;
- the Comancine builders (located at Como
in Lombardy);
- the Compagnonnage (the medieval French
association of workmen);
- Oliver Cromwell;
- the Dionysian artificers (c. 1000 BC in
Asia Minor);
- the Druids;
- the Essenes;
- the Gnostic teachers of 1st
and 2nd century Alexandria;
- the Jesuits;
- the Noachidae (legendary descendants of
Noah);
- the Pythagoreans (at Crotona, southern
Italy);
- the Rosicrucians;
- the Royal Society;
- the Socinians (a widespread late
16th century heretical sect from Vicenza, led by
Fausto Paolo Sozzini);
- the medieval operative
stonemasons;
- the Royal House of Stuart and, of
course
- the Knights Templar.
If any one of these were valid then the
Masonic phenomenon might be fitted comfortably within Faivre’s
list. However, there are some major obstacles to using that
historiographical model.
The task of tracing ever earlier origins has
been made almost impossible because not only are there huge gaps
in the sequences of evidence which mean that whole centuries
cannot be accounted for, all of the available earliest evidence is
extremely fragmentary and scattered. Consequently, much has been
made of very little indeed! The evidence, such as it is, hardly
presents a clear, complete or general picture. After more than 110
years of exhaustive investigating Masonic writers are no nearer to
finding the missing evidence that would help them to prove clear
origins for the Masonic phenomenon and so draw up a continuous
narrative. Many have been keen to establish reputations and to
sell their books but they may be mistaken in assuming that
speculative Freemasonry had only one origin and, crucially, they
have tended to ignore its wholly syncretistic nature – a nature
which is shown clearly in that published evidence(e.g., in Knoop,
Jones and Hamer’s Early Masonic Catechisms and their
Early Masonic Pamphlets). More will be said about
Freemasonry’s characteristic syncretistic borrowing
later.
This deficiency in the evidence was
identified by the indefatigable Rev. Dr. James Anderson DD
(1680?-1739) as early as 1723 when he was commissioned by the
nascent Premier Grand Lodge in London to compose a book of
Constitutions for it. He was not a reliable historian, even
within the standards of mere antiquarianism of those credulous
times, and he invented most of his Masonic history according to
his whim. However, he recognised that there were big gaps in his
narrative and explained them by stating that zealous freemasons
wanted to protect their secrets. They had declined to surrender
their precious MSS to his well-intentioned inquiries and had
burned them. He claimed that
… many of the Fraternity’s Records of
this [i.e., Charles II’s] reign and former Reigns [my
emphasis] were lost in the next [i.e., James II’s] and at the
Revolution [1688]; and many of ‘em were too hastily burnt in
our Time from a Fear of making Discoveries; so that we have
not so ample an account as would be
wish’d…
Later in the same ‘history’, he expanded
that claim thus:
This year [1720], at some private
Lodges, several very valuable Manuscripts (for they had
nothing yet in Print) concerning the Fraternity, their Lodges,
Regulations, Charges, Secrets, and Usages … were too hastily
burnt by some scrupulous Brothers that those Papers might not
fall into strange Hands.
One of the most important of these missing
sources was a MS which had been compiled by Nicholas Stone
(1586-1647), the King’s Master Mason during the lifetime of Inigo
Jones. He had been a Master of the famous London Company of
[Operative] Masons in 1633 but even he, prestigious as he was
among other architects, was not admitted into membership of the
more exclusive, hidden inner association, or ‘Acceptioun’ within
that Company until 1639. Anderson knew of the existence of that MS
which was generally esteemed. It had been of some significance for
speculative freemasons generally so its loss was therefore even
more to be regretted.
The second quotation from Anderson above
would seem to imply that the earliest Lodges had already got some
corporate form (a collectivity) and some kind of organisation
because it uses the words ‘Fraternity’ and ‘Regulations’. Clearly
speculative Freemasonry did not spring into being ex nihilo
in June 1717. Only four London Lodges, which had
existed ‘from Time Immemorial’, bothered to meet then in order,
inter alia, to revive the ancient custom of
Lodges meeting together in ‘Quarterly Communication’. The
likelihood is the English freemasons were reacting as Scots did
later in Scotland in 1736 when a general invitation was sent out
by a few enthusiastic Edinburgh freemasons to all of the 100+
Lodges known to exist in various parts of Scotland then. The idea
was for them to establish their own Grand Lodge (to match the
London and Dublin ventures?). However, representatives of only 11
of the Lodges bothered to attend so it can be said that the Grand
Lodge of Scotland and the Grand Lodge of England were founded by a
minority of the Lodges then existing. In any case, by the time the
first Engraved List of Lodges was published by the Premier
Grand Lodge in 1723, there were no less than 51 Lodges meeting in
London alone. By 1725, when the next such List was
published, there were at least 13 more Lodges either near London
or in the provinces. The existence of a total of 64 Lodges is
confirmed by the Minutes of the Premier Grand Lodge. Only 16 of
these did not bother to return lists of their members but,
allowing for a few dual memberships, it seems that 48 of the
Lodges then had about 730 members between them. The point is that
there cannot have been a such a huge expansion of the numbers of
Lodges or of their members in only five years (1717-1723). The
Masonic phenomenon must have pre-existed 1717.
This deficiency in the range and number of
the earliest primary sources did not deter Anderson nor has it
deterred others since. ‘Whistling in the dark’, some Masonic
historiographers claim that there must be hitherto untapped,
hidden MSS which will provide the missing vital evidence of much
earlier Masonic activities and thereby help to establish clear
connection between the Masonic phenomenon as manifested in London
in 1717 and earlier generations, perhaps even with the famed
medieval operative stonemasons (the obvious originators in view of
the rituals’ emphases on King Solomon’s Temple, construction work
and Working Tools) or even other, earlier originators. However,
these writers tend to ignore the real possibility that the field
has been fully ploughed by now. They ignore, for instance, the
meticulous work done by two renowned Victorian historiographical
projects that
- are still on-going;
- employ armies of professional
historians of various specialisms and
- are independent of any Masonic
wishful-thinking and/or prejudices.
The Royal Commission on Historical
Manuscripts (HMC) was established in 1869 to enquire and report on
collections of MSS of value for the study of British history in
private hands: i.e., its job was to locate and catalogue all
British historical non-governmental records of all subjects
wherever situated and not in deposit in the Public Record Office.
Since its inception it has published 239 volumes of its catalogue
and created 41,000 unpublished catalogues as well as 150,000
separate minor listings which together form the National Register
of Archives. It also maintains the Manorial Documents Register and
ARCHON, the archives register for all UK statutory depositories.
The resulting enormous database is now available for on-line
searches. An enquiry on ‘Freemasons’ was made by the present
writer to reveal that there are only 11 such deposits registered
nationally – apart from the annual returns required to be made to
the County Clerks of the Peace (under the Secret Societies Act of
1799 until 1967). All of these are small, none are earlier than
1794 and only one, the records of the short-lived Scottish Lodge
in Rome in the 1730's, remains in a private collection in
Scotland.
The Victoria County Histories were
started in 1899 and aimed at providing an encyclopaedic,
multi-volumed history of every English county and of their
constituent cities, towns and parishes. All of these volumes have
been characterised by rigorous, original research. This huge
project enjoys, therefore, an international reputation as a
standard work of reference for English local history. So far 200+
volumes have been published. Each county set has
- general volumes, that deal with
administrative history, , local history and archaeology;
- topographical volumes, that deal with
geography, geology and the detailed histories of all of the
settlements, churches, educational and charitable
institutions.
No accumulated index is complied yet
However, the present writer has checked each of the county sets
published to date and none of them have any references to pre-1717
Freemasonry other than those well-known from elsewhere (e.g., Dr
Robert Plot’s allusion in his Natural History of
Staffordshire, 1686).
Then there are the other distinguished
associations, like the Camden, Dugdale and Surtees Societies,
which are dedicated to the authoritative transcription and
publication of hitherto unknown MSS of local historical value.
Furthermore, almost very English county has at least one society
of enthusiastic scholars who publish their own local history
transactions.
None of this remarkable, if slow,
accumulation of original data has any trace of pre-1717
Freemasonry. If there are still any undetected MSS not in Masonic
archives then they must be very well hidden. It seems reasonable
to say that it is unlikely that any family or county archives in
England will yield any more substantial traces of pre-1717
activities. If there had been such MSS then they would have been
revealed by now in these national trawls. Perhaps it is time to
draw a line under the historico-chronological approach to
providing an answer about ever earlier origins of speculative
Freemasonry. Obviously, individual researchers will continue to
make genuine discoveries in the course of their work in archives,
some of them will be non-Masonic archives, but these will be of
minor interest. It is probable now that no major archival findings
relating generally to the nature of pre-1717 Freemasonry will be
made. Of course, one should never discount serendipity entirely
but the chances of anything substantial being discovered which
would prove a direct, general connection between the Masonic
phenomenon and early Hermetic ventures of whatever nature seem to
be slim indeed.
Consider the theory that speculative
Freemasonry originated from the English medieval stonemasons’
trade guilds. If that were so, then it would be crucial to support
that proposition by examining the nature of the earliest available
evidence relating to those guilds’ activities. The most relevant
of this would be the so-called ‘Old Charges’, 113 of which have
survived (though there are hints of 14 others that are now
missing). Nearly two-thirds of them are pre-1717; 55 are pre-1700;
4 dated from c. 1600; 1 is dated precisely ‘Christmas Day 1583’;
another is dated c. 1400-140 and the earliest available comes from
1390. These MSS were intended to regulate the operative
stonemasons’ work and 25 of them are entitled ‘Constitution’ or
‘Constitutions’. Two others are bound in with the printed text of
the 1723 book of Constitutions; four others were written
out in Lodges’ Minute Books and another in a Lodge’s register of
members’ mason marks. Sometimes, as in the records of the Lodge at
Stirling, the Old Charges were hand written, mounted and then
framed. There the Lodge members believed that their meetings would
not be legal unless the precious MS was displayed in the room
where they were meeting. Another MS, from Aberdeen, is entitled
‘The Mason Charter’. In a Lodge in Bradford the members regarded
their copy of the Old Charges as the authority for them to confer
the Degrees. Furthermore, as these MSS describe at least some of
the procedures that had to be followed when any man was made a
mason and even include small extracts of the prescribed ritual, it
is clear that they were used in some way at Lodges’ meetings as
guides to the ceremonies. For example, one MS describes a meeting
which took place in Scarborough in 1705. Another, dated 1693 and
from York, includes a list of the Lodge members. A third was
written expressly on 16 October 1646 at Warrington for the
Initiation of the alchemist, antiquary, astrologer and Fellow of
the Royal Society, Elias Ashmole (1617-1692). Hence, it has been
established fairly well that these very old MSS provided the
earliest freemasons with their ordinances and their Lodges with
their authority, respectability and (partial) ritual).
One important feature of them all is the
remarkable degree of their uniformity of content and expression.
They all say the same things in more or less the same ways. The
only possible explanation for this consistency is that they are
all related and are descended from an ur-text that is now
lost but which was evidently edited and revised many times and
recopied hundreds of times in the period 1390-1717 all over
England and Scotland. Those that have survived represent only a
small proportion of these copies
The MSS seem to be prima facie
evidence of the descent of the speculative Freemasonry (which
began to emerge in the latter half of the 17th century
in England) from the medieval operative stonemasons’ trade guilds
with their craft secrets, traditions and ‘doctrines’. However,
careful examination of their contents for possible Hermetic
features has revealed no such characteristics. In summary form the
running order of their content is as follows:
- An invocation to the Holy Trinity;
- Announcements as to the purpose and the
contents;
- A brief description of the Seven Liberal
Sciences – Geometry being regarded as synonymous with
‘Masonry’;
- A proof of the fundamental nature of
Geometry;
- An extended traditional history of
Geometry, Masonry and Architecture based wholly on the
Bible;
- The method of taking the mason’s
oath;
- An admonition to remain true to that
oath;
- Some detailed regulations regarding the
masons’ trade and personal conduct and
- A concluding obligation to remain true to
the oath.
Remember, these are not public documents but
were carefully kept from the eyes of non-masons. The phenomenon
exhibited in the Old Charges is patently quite different from that
which emerged in London in 1717. For one thing, there were no
hermetic doctrines cherished among medieval operative stonemasons.
This is confirmed by the overwhelming body of other documentary
evidence that has been drawn from other sources by architectural
historians. Apart from the analyses of the massive amounts of
material on the activities of some 2000+ Gothic architects and
stonemasons post-1200 AD (which includes their carefully drafted
building contracts), there are at least 400 medieval architectural
compendia, or treatises, on building techniques written by
Master Masons. These began as small personal notebooks. Some ended
eventually as published booklets and others were annotated and
enlarged by later operative stonemasons. Many were reworked
entirely by their authors in order to formulate definitive
statements of their working practices and the underlying
principles which they tried to apply in their daily work.
Generally, these are infinitely more personal, tentative and
experimental. They are repositories of the then existing practices
and theorems and, since we can also detect architectural ideas and
stylistic changes as they were formulated, they are also intimate
reflections of the actual creative process. As such they served
several related purposes:
- to accumulate theoretical and practical
data;
- to create a file of designs and
techniques to educate younger stonemasons;
- to establish a base for discussion with
peers and patrons;
- to function as a kind of licence
testifying to their compilers’ knowledge an skill as masons as
well as attesting to their range of interests, breadth of
travelling and the intensity of their aesthetic vision;
- to prepare the accumulated wisdom for
eventual publication and
- to systematise the data for use by their
successors.
Perhaps the most comprehensive of these
useful didactic MSS is that compiled by the famous French Master
Mason, Villard de Honnecourt (c.1175-1240) during the period c.
1215-1233. Even though his notebook reveals that he lacked
original and creative design talent and that he was probably never
given a major architectural commission, nevertheless it shows that
his was a lively, versatile mind, delighting in machinery and
gadgets. He emerges as a Master Craftsman, an intellectual with a
keen sense of observation and a strong sense of his own role in
posterity. Yet nowhere in Villard’s famous notebook nor in any of
the extant writings of his European contemporaries (e.g., Jean de
Liege, Hugues Libergier and Pierre de Monteuil) is there any
Hermetic content. Much has been made, for instance, of the
silver-point drawing of an adult clothed male figure (in f. 37)
asserting that Villard must have been pondering the human form as
a perfect harmonious piece of God’s handiwork – a sort of
Vitruvian Man – thereby revealing himself to have been
entertaining some appreciation of Hermetic cosmology. The truth
is, however, more prosaic. His figural sketches (of which this was
one) display a considerable lack of manual skill in their
execution. Thus was why, to assist his making of these drawings,
he used the technique of a mixture of solid and dotted lines to
ensure that he got the proportions correct. This is confirmed by
his own note (in f. 36) which alludes to this well-known and
widely practised technique used by apprentice artists and
employing ‘the discipline of geometry ‘por legierement
ovrer’ (= ‘to facilitate the work’). There are similar
geometric schemes imposed in his sketches of anila figures copied
from a ‘Bestiary’ (similar to that in the Bodleian Library – ref.
Ashmole MS 1511) but even the pentagrams included in his sketch of
the heraldic eagle or the one used in his sketch of the two
trumpeters seem gratutitous. It is clear from Francois Bucher’s
close analysis of the notebook that, though Villard understood the
tenents of Gothic architectural theory which were codified and
generalised only after his death, the philosophical basis of the
Gothic style of architecture (e.g., the theory of light of
Dionysis the Areopagite) did not interest him nor did
numerological details hold any fascination for him.
What is important, of course, is that
Villard was the norm for his profession. A series of academic
studies, dating from the late 19th century to the
present day, has shown that the socially prominent and wealthy
Master Masons were well-educated, powerful men in their day but
they were hardly esoterists involved in any Hermetic enterprise.
They were hard-headed businessmen, subject to all of the familiar
restrictions imposed by the penalty clauses in their contracts
that had been drawn up by demanding patrons. They were far too
busy to meet deadlines and to keep down the costs to be
preoccupied in trying to incorporate secret designs into their
buildings. Some writers (like George Lesser) seek to establish
that these medieval Master Masons were magi who designed
their cathedrals according to a ‘sacred geometry’. They claim that
the buildings contain Hermetic patterns in their plans and
decorations. However, most reputable architectural historians have
examined these claims and dismissed them. Such patterns are mere
impositions of complex mathematics and geometry on perfectly
logical, practical and self-contained structures derived once
again from wishful thinking.
Finally, the historico-chronological model
can be rejected for the present purpose because it ignores a more
theoretical consideration. It focuses on the analysis of the
masonic phenomenon as evidenced only by texts or similar artefacts
and it neglects the defining characteristic of the Hermetic
venture: that it is a ‘lived-through’ experience. While the
history of the western Hermetic tradition can be charted using its
own texts, the whole purpose of Hermeticism has not been merely to
produce those fascinating documents but to inculcate practices
that would generate ‘lived-through’ esoteric experience. I would
suggest that this was precisely the aim of speculative Freemasonry
– at least in its formative period – and has become one that is
now largely and unfortunately unfulfilled in the English-speaking
Masonic world for reasons which I hope will be made clear
later.
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